I have been following this thread with some interest. A few months ago a
friend of mine from Fore Systems told me about the 'ACTS' project. NASA and
Ohio-State and quite a few others were doing research into the Gigabit
Satelite Network. There was a test between Sony in Japan and I 'BELIEVE'
JPL in Pasadena of hight def video transmissions over an OC-3 circuit. I
heard something about a quasi commercial deployment of another ACTS
project. Anybody heard anything about this? If enough birds like ACTS were
sent up, this could be a boon for ISP's maybe. Of course I live in this
ideal world where everybody is reasonable, intelligent, and well yea I know
things are just quite the opposite.
If MCI/AT&T/NTT/GTE put this into motion then were doomed, but if Hughes
(read someone who doesn't own an ISP yet) put one up, it might be a bit
more promising. Who knows...
Do satellites really stand a chance against fibre? Most people think not,
and more specifically that their competitiveness shall continue to decline
as time progresses. Not exactly the kind of thing one wants to lay out
large capital expenditures on...
Of course, I'm just a tool of conventional wisdom, as poorly conveyed by
the media, when it comes to these issues. Sean, if you're still a jobless
bum then you should consider starting your own newsletter. 8^)
I have been following this thread with some interest. A few months ago a
friend of mine from Fore Systems told me about the 'ACTS' project. NASA and
Ohio-State and quite a few others were doing research into the Gigabit
Satelite Network. There was a test between Sony in Japan and I 'BELIEVE'
JPL in Pasadena of hight def video transmissions over an OC-3 circuit. I
heard something about a quasi commercial deployment of another ACTS
project. Anybody heard anything about this? If enough birds like ACTS were
sent up, this could be a boon for ISP's maybe. Of course I live in this
ideal world where everybody is reasonable, intelligent, and well yea I know
things are just quite the opposite.
Which type of satellite network was talked about? If we're talking the
big, far-away GEO satellites, my guess is that the latency involved
would kill such a project. OTOH, LEO satellites could work (see:
Teledesic), but involve a massive investment and lots of satellites.
High orbit, geosyncronous sattelites do not stand much of a chance against
land lines as the latency on the links is quite high. Low orbit
satellites, however, can be quite effective competition assuming that they
have enough satellites to get coverage. These types of satellites are the
ones that Gates is thinking of launching as well as several other
companies/consortiums. When we can all have > 1MB/sec connectivity
wireless to our laptops/video portable phones, with global coverage,
satellites will rule the day.
Justin "I still like land lines" Newton
Justin W. Newton
Senior Network Architect
Priori Networks http://www.priori.net
ISP/C, Director at Large http://www.ispc.org